Tuesday, August 08, 2006

The Google Maps Flight Simulator: Goggles

In the category of "Google Maps games" (or general web time wasters) here is a really cool use of the Google Maps API that sees the creation of a simple flight simulator that takes place on top of Google Maps satellite imagery. "Goggles" allows you to pilot a small plane as you fly over various world cities. They include: London, Dublin , San Francisco, New York, Washington DC, Amsterdam, Berlin, Paris, Helsinki, Sydney, Hong Kong and Tokyo. If planet earth isn't enough for your flying pleasure take your cartoon aircraft to outer space and buzz the craters of the Moon or cruise over the vast red landscape of Mars after choosing it from the main menu! Definitely one of the more fun ways to integrate with Google Maps, facilitated by the Google Maps API! [Thanks Rich!]

Related: Frank Taylor from the Google Earth Blog tells you how you can do similar flyovers in Google Earth..